My Thoughts about Maya Angelou’s “Still I Rise”

The poem “Still I Rise” is an inspirational poem. The theme of this poem is perseverance through hardship. The theme of this poem applies to all humans because people need to be motivated to keep going. In the poem, she says “you may shoot me with your words, you may cut me with your eyes, you may kill me with your hatefulness but still, like air, I rise.” She is basically saying that whatever you say or however you look at me I’m still going to continue on with my life.

You can tell when the speaker’s change both through visualization and speaking aloud. Through visualization you can see that each first seven stanzas is four lines and together and in the last part each line is only one stanzas. The first seven stanzas depends on somebody and act as a victim. The last part the speaker becomes independent.

Some might say you have to experience tragedies in your life to become a great poet. I say you actually do not. I say that because a lot of poets are good poets. If experienced tragedies then your poems are going to be more feelings felt.

About Brittney Daniels

Brittney is a 9th grader who is a student at CSMB High. She is on the cheerleading team and is currently trying to pick up her grades. She can be humble about things but she'll always come around. She likes making people laugh and smile because she thinks everyone deserves to be happy, sometimes.
View all posts by Brittney Daniels →